Saturday, December 24, 2005

Anxiety Index: Xmas Edition

Brought to you by Piranha via America Blog
Thursday, December 22, 2005

While Bush was busy illegally spying on Americans, someone just stole 400 pounds of high-powered explosives including undetectable C-4
by John in DC - 12/22/2005 01:24:00 PM

Seriously. This is the stuff used to blow up commercial airliners. Merry Christmas!

From ABC:

Officials are investigating the theft of 400 pounds of high-powered plastic explosives in New Mexico. The material was stolen from a bunker owned by a bomb expert who works at a national research lab outside Albuquerque, N.M.
ABC News has been told it's one of the most significant thefts of high-power explosives ever in the United States....
The missing 400 pounds of explosives includes 150 pounds of what is known as C-4 plastic, or "sheet explosive," which can be shaped and molded and is often used by terrorists and military operatives.
"It is a very dangerous material, we want to keep this off the streets," Cherry told ABC News.
Also, 2,500 detonators were missing from a storage explosive container, or magazine, in a bunker owned by Cherry Engineering....
And if that didn't scare you, get this:
The missing material included 150 pounds of the plastic explosive compound C-4 and 250 pounds of undetectable "sheet explosives" - a DuPont flexible explosive material that can be hidden in books and letters - as well as blasting caps, the news report said.

Did you get that?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Perhaps you missed this?

(NYT) Police Infiltrate Protests, Videotapes Show

"Undercover New York City police officers have conducted covert surveillance in the last 16 months of people protesting the Iraq war, bicycle riders taking part in mass rallies and even mourners at a street vigil for a cyclist killed in an accident, a series of videotapes show.

In glimpses and in glaring detail, the videotape images reveal the robust presence of disguised officers or others working with them at seven public gatherings since August 2004.

The officers hoist protest signs. They hold flowers with mourners. They ride in bicycle events. At the vigil for the cyclist, an officer in biking gear wore a button that said, "I am a shameless agitator." She also carried a camera and videotaped the roughly 15 people present.

Beyond collecting information, some of the undercover officers or their associates are seen on the tape having influence on events. At a demonstration last year during the Republican National Convention, the sham arrest of a man secretly working with the police led to a bruising confrontation between officers in riot gear and bystanders."

reb said...

that's heinous!

Anonymous said...

The investigation that uncovered the police infiltration was done by Eileen Clancy & the folks at I-Witness Video. They're forensic video analysists who work with lawyers, and who cooperated last year w/ the National Lawyers Guild in litigating the mass arrests at the RNC. Over 90% of the nearly 1800 arrests resulted in charges dismissed or in acquittals. I tried to paste in links below, but they look funny & don't seem clickable (sorry).

http://iwitnessvideo.info/
http://www.nlgnyc.org/pdf/videotraining.pdf

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/04/14/1349256